Tuesday, April 20, 2010

If anyone out there is a committed reader, I apologize for the sporadic updates. This time of year is ridiculously busy in wrapping up the school year, with all of Jonathan's end of the semester/end of graduate school dealings, AND all of the housing paperwork....there's just not enough hours in the day.

Work, home, run, clean, more work stuff at home, dinner, sleep.

Repeat day in and day out.

BUT, on this nice, rainy spring evening (thank you Jesus for sending the rain.....we haven't seen nearly enough "April Showers" to clean out some of this pollen), I have a few moments to sit down and catch you up!!

1. In dealing with all the "moving madness," we had to make some insurance decisions and after doing so, would receive a great deal of mail regarding our new insurance. Well......the insurance company just went on ahead and sent our paperwork to our new address (this was all that they had since we were working with them to get home insurance)!!! Needless to say, our lender, Amazing Amy, had to hand write our current address and FWD all of this mail to us, BUT, it was SO INCREDIBLY AWESOME to see our NEW, PERMANENT address on paper. So cool. :)

Niiiiice. Ignore the blur; I wasn't about to post mail with our address. Regardless, that's exciting!!

2. Again, if you are a dedicated reader, you'll remember from a previous post that, dear friends and family have been keeping us updated with texts and calls as they make "drive-bys" in Piedmont. :)

With the arrival of Spring and all the beauty outside that comes with, we have a dogwood tree right outside our beautiful home-to-be that has bloomed beautifully!!! We received and update on this via text by Jonathan's mom, Sandra, about a week and a half ago.

White and gorgeous!! Cannot wait to see that from the window in the Great Room!!

3. BIGGEST UPDATE: WE'RE CLOSING!!!!!!

Tomorrow, April 21st, is the BIG DAY!!! We have actually been VERY lucky, or so I'm told from previous homebuyers, in the matter of our closing date. It has only changed twice and we're only about 20 days off from the original date that was set. Because of Palmetto Heroes that I had previously posted about as well, the paperwork from state housing kept getting delayed, hence the closing being delayed.

We were told last week, that this week would be it, and then received the call via our lender this AM that the paperwork had been processed and packaged up and we're good to go for tomorrow afternoon.

YES, YES, YES, YES, YES!!!!!!!!!!!! God is good and the Edens gone have a HOUSE tomorrow!!

4. Praise Him, He IS good, He answers prayer!!! If you remember that dreadful test that I also previously posted about, I PASSED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YEAH!!! God is SO good, and it is ONLY because of prayer that I passed and I can PROMISE you that!!! I have a really interesting, funny story behind taking the test, so, if you're interested, you should ask. :)

MY CERTIFICATE OF COMPLETION!!! Hahaha!!!

5. Jonathan had his final, senior thesis review of his academic career a week ago today!!! This is a HUGE accomplishment and moves him just one step closer to achieving his ultimate goal of becoming a licensed architect. I have never been more proud of him in my life. He has worked so unbelievably hard not just this semester, but for the past 2 years, and it has definitely paid off. It went really well, and, as I predicted, he kicked butt. That's just the way it is. :)

Right after presenting!! And oddly enough, we did NOT plan to match. I promise. He didn't even see me that morning before I left for work and of course when I left, he was still in bed. We're just cool like that. :)

Excited is an understatement!!! Done and DONE!!

So other than housing and school for us both, that's about all that's been going on. Kind of boring I know.

We're keeping plenty busy and definitely enjoying the spring sunshine!! Aside from exam week and graduation, Jonathan will pretty much be all finished up with his MArch degree this time next week. And the pool opened FINALLY this past Friday, so I predict lots of sunshine in my future!!

We definitely do not deserve it, but God is SO good!!! Happy Spring!!!

Friday, April 2, 2010

Celebrating Good Friday, I have spent much of today reflecting on the cross and its purpose in our lives.

The cross is:

Eternal life.

Salvation.

Grace.

A bridge.

Sacrifice.

Mercy.

An answer.

Truth.

Redemption.

Forgiveness.

Love.

Sin taken away.

Selflessness.

Life everlasting.

These are just a few words that I have thought of throughout the day as I reflected on what the cross means to me and my relationship with Christ. I hate that it takes a holiday for me to put that much thought into something so significant, something that should really be the drive of my daily walk with the Lord. If you haven't, I encourage you to take a moment and remember the sacrifice made some 2,000 years ago, and I encourage myself to remember this the other 364 days of the year.

One of my most favorite pictures EVER. I captured this right outside a beautiful church in Dublin, Ireland. God is all nations, and all people.